It has been estimated that 15% of couples in the United States are unable to conceive within one year of the first attempt at conception and nearly 3 million of such couples seek medical help annually. Further studies have shown that infertility may be contributed to the male 35% of the time and the female 55% of the time with the remaining 10% being undetermined.
Economic pressures, the women's liberation movement and other social factors caused many women in the 1970's and 1980's to forego child bearing and raising of a family in favor of pursuit of a career. Now many of those women are interested in starting a family, but the postponement of pregnancy has resulted in significantly increased rates of infertility. Further, increasing incidences of pelvic inflammatory diseases are also thought to be a major reason for increases in infertility. Specifically, such pelvic infections lead to the formation of scar tissue around the ovaries and the fallopian tubes which impedes the transport of oocytes for fertilization. Additionally, ovulatory dysfunction accounts for a substantial percentage of infertility cases.
From the above, it should be appreciated that the treatment of infertility is an important medical science issue and at present, it is a growing concern.
It may also be estimated that over 1 million artificial insemination procedures have been performed in the United States during each of the last three years. Generally, intrauterine insemination is broadly utilized in the treatment of infertile couples including, for example, those wherein the female is suffering from mucus hostility or the male suffers from moderately abnormal semen parameters. The most commonly utilized intrauterine insemination technique is the bolus technique which comprises the single deposition of a very large number of spermatozoa into the uterine cavity. For example, a deposition of 0.6 ml of spermatozoa preparation may be injected into the uterus of the patient.
This sudden and relatively high concentration of spermatozoa in the uterine cavity contrasts sharply with the relatively slow release of small numbers of spermatozoa from the endocervix into the upper genital tract following natural intercourse. It has therefore, been suggested that the bolus technique may not be particularly effective in achieving conception since the produced effect contrasts sharply with the slow and gradual stages of sperm transport into the fallopian tube resulting from natural intercourse.
Toward this end, Nabil S. Mubarib and his associates have previously developed a slow release intrauterine insemination technique relying on an auto-syringe driver providing for the delivery of approximately 50.times.10.sup.3 spermatozoa every minute for three hours. While this slow release intrauterine insemination technique has shown some promise, it does suffer from several shortcomings. First, the patient must remain in a supine position for the full three hour treatment period. Thus, the treatment procedure is time consuming and inconvenient. Second, the slow delivery of spermatozoa for even a three hour period is still not of sufficient duration to accurately mimic the prolonged slow release of small numbers of spermatozoa that occurs naturally over a period of up to 24 hours or more. Thus, a need is identified for an improved method for slow release intrauterine insemination.
Further, it should also be appreciated that many infectious diseases including but not limited to endometritis, pelvic inflammatory disease, endomyometritis and cervicitis may best be treated with the prolonged time-released delivery of a selected preparation of antibiotics such as penicillins, erythromycins, cephalosporins and metronidazole. Thus, a further need is identified for a more versatile apparatus for allowing the time-released delivery of a selected preparation into a patients uterine cavity where that selected preparation may, for example, be a spermatozoa preparation for artificial insemination or a medical preparation of drugs/antibiotics for treatment of diseases such as inflammatory infections.